IBANYS Weekly E-Newsletter | |
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This weekend, we celebrate the long Memorial Day weekend. IBANYS wishes all a safe, happy and healthy holiday. As we all know, Memorial Day (originally Decoration Day) is about much more than barbecues, picnics and ballgames. It is when we honor and mourn U.S. military personnel who have made the ultimate sacrifice in service to our country. As we celebrate, let’s remember the words of President Truman: “Our debt to the heroic men and valiant women in the service of our country can never be repaid. They have earned our undying gratitude. America will never forget their sacrifices.”
New York State Senate Banks Committee Chairman James Sanders (D-Queens) has accepted IBANYS’ invitation to address our Annual Convention on Tuesday, June 13 to discuss important topics related to community banking. Sen. Sanders is a sponsor of S.1762, “The New York Public Banking Act” to establish public banking in New York State, as well as S.1453 to allow credit unions to accept and secure deposits from municipal corporations. Earlier this month, IBANYS, represented by Chairman Anders Tomson and Pursuit's Steve Cohen, participated in a legislative roundtable on public banking hosted by Chairman Sanders. Here’s the Facebook recording:
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=707564487792997&id=100000270774151&mibextid=jf9HGS. It's well worth watching. Thanks to Anders and Steve for a terrific job on behalf of New York community banks!
Please register for IBANYS' Annual Convention "The Heartbeat of our Communities" June 12-14 – less than 3 WEEKS AWAY!! The brochure is attached. Book your rooms as soon as possible! Questions? Contact me at 716.880.9518 or Linda Gregware at 518.436.4646.
Don’t forget to SIGN UP FOR A Day with Jack Hubbard - June21 (you can find more information below under IBANYS meetings)
According to new national and state-level polling data that ICBA released, Americans in all 50 states have anincreasingly favorable view of community banking.
READ today's state and federal legislative and regulatory updates on policies being presented by our state and federal banking committees and regulatory agencies. We need your voice to reinforce our efforts. The sections include the latest bill introductions, legislative activity, committee agendas and regulatory actions. We need your feedback and comments on matters such as expanding the community banks deposit program to include credit unions, a feasibility study on public banking, credit unions and
municipal deposits, addressing the Capital Access program, utilizing the Business Development Districts and more!
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IBANYS Annual convention is less than a month away and we have an exciting addition to our agenda.
Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, James Sanders is attending our convention and is scheduled to speak on Tuesday, June 13th.
We always need our bankers voice to provide first-hand experience of what your bank does for your community. This is a great opportunity to hear from our state senator and discuss the important topics we are facing at the state level – forming a State/Public Bank and credit unions access to municipal deposits are always on top of the list.
Registration is still open, and we want more banks to attend! If the President and CEO cannot attend, give your C-suit executives and senior managers a chance to network with other bankers.
Support from our business partners has been outstanding and they would like to have an audience with some more of our community banks. Our sponsors and exhibitors are all filed, and we have about 150 attendees.
Attached is the convention brochure or you can register on the IBANYS website, www.ibanys.net. Make sure you book your rooms by calling The Turning Stone Resort and Casino.
Our goal is to do a little bit better than last year – our goal is to have 35-40 banks in attendance!! Please consider joining other NYS community banks who have already registered.
Great speakers, great food, great entertainment, and GREAT OPPORTUNITY TO NETWORK WITH YOUR FELLOW COMMUNITY BANKERS.
Regards,
John
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Join us Tuesday evening after dinner as Dueling Pianos, “presented by Dueling Pianos International entertains us with a fun, interactive battle of the “ivories”.
Video
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June 21st – Jack Hubbard on Building and Strengthening Relationships - Turning Stone Resort and Casino: Hear from Jack on his years of experience (over 50) in banking and how his tactics survive in the world of social media and innovative technology. It will be a great day to hear from one of the leading subject matter experts in banking. Click here for registration information | |
ASSOCIATE & PREFERRED PARTNERS | | |
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Banks Must Own Their Data to Compete and Innovate
The adoption of digital banking has been growing at exponential rates over the past several years. Fueled by an increase in remote lifestyles and evolved consumer preferences, digital banking channels now surpass that of the legacy banking channels. Many banks were already preparing for this trend and were able to quickly adapt as the COVID-19 pandemic rapidly changed the way companies interact with clients. Others were caught scrambling to modernize their digital capabilities and adopt the crucial technologies that play a pivotal role today and in the future of banking.
Read here
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World-wide demand
Buyers of U.S. debt come in many shapes and sizes.
By Jim Reber, ICBA Securities
I think we can all agree that there has been plenty to be concerned about in the last, say, five years. Some are environmental issues, some are social and, for community bankers, plenty are economic. What gets a lot of play in the business and even mainstream media is our growing national debt. There’s no doubt that the mountain of borrowings that keeps our federal government liquid and solvent is greater than ever before. It’s not surprising to me that there’s spirited debate about debt limits, or if Congress will ever in our lifetimes find a way to slow our dependence on deficit spending.
Read here
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LEGISLATIVE UPDATE
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Over the next two weeks, there are only seven more scheduled session days for the New York State Legislature until the scheduled adjournment on June 8. We have attached bill introductions from May 15th-19th, as well as legislative activity for last week and committee agendas for this week. Note. These are also posted weekly on IBANYS’ website, www.ibanys.net under the “Advocacy/Legislative Updates Tabs.
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Under new legislation under consideration by the State Legislature this week, New York would have the power to force private hedge funds to comply with debt relief deals the U.S. government brokers with cash-strapped foreign countries. The bill has “spurred warnings of far-reaching economic consequences from the financial industry, even as it has gained support from numerous religious groups and progressive unions.” Business groups urge block of NY bill to cap investment fund profits
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In a new memo obtained by POLITICO, experts criticized the changes to the state’s minimum wage included in the state budget agreement between the governor and the Legislature. The budget includes increasing the hourly rate downstate from $15 an hour to $16 an hour in 2024. Upstate, the rate will increase from $14.20 an hour currently to $15 an hour. Both will increase by 50 cents to hit $17 an hour and $16 an hour, respectively, by 2026. Beginning on Jan. 1, 2027, the wages will be annually indexed to inflation based on the Consumer Price Index.
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With just weeks to go until the end of the state legislative session, legislators are considering the "Clean Slate Act,” a major criminal justice reform to seal criminal records after a certain amount of time, enabling those individuals to more easily get jobs.
REGULATORY MATTERS
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The New York State Office of Cannabis Management Executive Director Alexander said the state’s slow rollout of cannabis licensing has been a necessary step in achieving equity. “The slow rollout is the product of a choice. That choice is to do the hard thing.” He spoke to City & State’s Jeff Coltin about his unwavering commitment to “make sure that those who are impacted have an opportunity to participate in a meaningful way.”
POLITICAL PERSPECTIVE
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Low tax receipts for the month of April has fiscal watchdogs concerned about entering a budget deficit right at the start of the fiscal year, according to Gotham Gazette.
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Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado has kept his distance from the Governor’s biggest recent political fights, including her failed nomination of Hector LaSalle as the state’s Chief Judge, her unprecedented proposal to increase housing, and recent changes to the state’s bail laws. “I feel that a lot of folks are detached from government,” Delgado said in a wide-ranging Spectrum News interview.
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New York State lost 25,000 jobs in the private sector during April, according to the NYS Department of Labor, although the unemployment rate declined from 4.1% to 4% from March to April. In New York, the highest rates were in New York City at 5.3 percent, down from 5.7 percent a year ago. Nationally, job growth is outpacing New York.
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Syracuse is one of the best performing cities in the United States. Other Upstate New York’s cities made it into the top list, too. Upstate New York
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LEGISLATIVE UPDATE
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During last week’s Capital Summit, ICBA also announced its 2023 Policy Resolutions and released new national and state-level polling data showing Americans in all 50 states have an increasingly favorable view of community banking.
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The House Financial Services Committee is scheduled to meet at 10 a.m. (Eastern time) today for a hearing on Federal Housing Finance Agency oversight. Also this week, the panel has a markup slated for tomorrow on regulatory accountability legislation and a subcommittee hearing Thursday on international financial institutions.
REGULATORY UPDATE
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FDIC Chairman Gruenberg said the agency’s research suggests that efforts to connect unbanked consumers to the banking system are having an effect. Gruenberg said FDIC data show the proportion of unbanked U.S. households has fallen by about one-third since 2015, with changing economic conditions estimated to account for half of the improvement. The FDIC last year expanded its #GetBanked public awareness campaign that encourages unbanked consumers to consider opening a checking account. Community bankers can use resources available in the ICBA National Campaign Toolkit to help spread the word about community banking and drive consumers to banklocally.org -- which offers a directory of community banks.
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Chairman Gruenberg said the FDIC's guarantee to consumers remains strong despite this spring's bank failures, the agency's chairman. He also noted FDIC research shows persistent disparities in access to banks by class and race, and defended the agency's crackdown on nonbanks that fraudulently claim to be protected by deposit insurance. Read story
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The Fed reported that access to banking services remained high in 2022, though the economic well-being of U.S. households declined from 2021. 94% of U.S. adults had a bank account last year, important for people’s financial well-being. The use of relatively new financial services remained comparatively low, with 3% of adults using cryptocurrency for financial transactions and 12% using “buy now, pay later” services.
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Federal Reserve Governor Bowman said policymakers should ensure the response to recent bank failures does not undermine regulatory tailoring and risk-based supervision She said overseeing banks based on their size, risk, business model, and complexity provides appropriate proportionality to regulatory oversight. “It is simply common sense that what works well for the largest global systemically important banks is not appropriate for regional and community banks. The view that we extend the reach of overly complex and outsized regulatory requirements to banks that are smaller and less complex ignores some likely results—doing so will lead to bank consolidation and will potentially push banking activities outside of the regulated banking system.”
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Fed Governor Bowman said policymakers should focus on: 1) Conducting an independent third-party review to ensure an impartial understanding of the failures of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank; 2) Ensuring supervisors do a better job of using the existing regulatory toolkit to identify key issues and risks, rather than creating more tools, and 3) Considering targeted reforms that might be necessary without using the failures as a pretext to push for unrelated regulatory changes. The Wall Street Journal
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The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency is encouraging financial institutions to sign up for its vulnerability scanning services to help reduce exposure to cyber threats. The no-cost tool evaluates organizations’ external network presence by executing continuous scans of publicly accessible services and providing weekly vulnerability reports and ad-hoc alerts.
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ICBA continues urging community bankers to urge their members of Congress to support a House resolution to nullify the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Section 1071 rule to establish data collection and reporting standards for small-business loan applicants. ICBA’s Be Heard grassroots action center makes it easy to urge them to pass H.J.Res.50, a congressional disapproval of the 1071 rule to dictate that it has no force or effect. Community bankers can use an ICBA customizable op-ed to spread the word about the ICBA-opposed rule. Available on ICBA’s “Tell Your Story” Toolkit, it cites the rule’s negative impact on privacy and its potential to harm the women- and minority-owned businesses it is designed to help. The CFPB recently issued a small entity compliance guide on the 1071 rule. ICBA also offers a summary of the rule that details its scope of coverage, key definitions, compliance dates, collection and reporting procedures, and more.
INDUSTRY DIFFERENTIATION
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Addressing last week's Capital Summit, ICBA President and CEO Rebeca Romero Rainey noted ICBA has worked relentlessly to differentiate community banks from larger institutions in the wake of the failures, leading to the FDIC’s proposal to fully exempt community banks under $5 billion from paying any special assessment to replenish the Deposit Insurance Fund. Community bankers can use resources available in the ICBA National Campaign Toolkit to help spread the word about the community bank difference. The campaign has achieved 100 million impressions, and its video advertisements have been viewed to completion more than 20 million times. In a recent blog post and video she said round-the-clock media outreach and focused advocacy efforts are helping to differentiate community banks.
INDUSTRY INSIGHTS
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Bank deposits in reciprocal accounts, which allow depositors to move money to other lenders in order to utilize Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. coverage — capped at $250,000 per account — hit a record high of $221 billion at the end of the first quarter, up from $158 billion at the end of 2022, according to records from Bank Reg Data. Financial Times
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